


The Only Thing

by Ohmyjoshh



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Depressing, SERIOUSLY suicidal thoughts out the ass, Sad, Songfic, Sufjan Stevens - Freeform, Suicidal Thoughts, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-26
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-08-17 08:39:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8137546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ohmyjoshh/pseuds/Ohmyjoshh
Summary: Josh doesn't know how not to love Tyler. Most of the time, it's not so bad. Truly loving someone means just needing them to be happy, but sometimes Josh loses himself in selfish thoughts. Title from the song "The Only Thing" by Sufjan Stevens.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I just don't know man, I just created this garbage in two hours in my boyfriend's bed, listening to the whole 'Carrie and Lowell' album from which the song that inspired this fic came. You should listen to that album while you read this. They go well together. Also, you should probably not even read this oops.

Josh kept his eyes tailored to the empty space far in front of his headlights, relying on his peripheral vision to let him know if he was in some danger of hitting something. It was late into the night, or maybe early into the morning. Josh didn’t care enough to check. His mind continued to wonder things that scared him, like how long would it hurt for if he drove into that canyon he could see to his right? There was no metal barrier or fence to stop him. It was just a few yards of grass and then a drop deep into someplace that didn’t matter because if Josh drove off, he’d be dead before he got to get familiar with what was at the bottom. He could just jerk the wheel and be gone. He thought hard about it, not necessarily considering it, but thinking about it at any rate. He wondered if he would fight at the last minute, if he would even care about whether he lived through the impact. He would be buried there, right where he died. The canyon was deep and in late spring as it was, there was just enough plant life to hide the metal mass of what would be left of his car.

Josh forced his mind to wonder elsewhere then, before the idea seemed too appealing. Josh thought about Greek mythology, about Perseus slaying Medusa with the mirrored shield Athena gave him, and then Pegasus emerging from her dead form. Something light from something dark and difficult. Something beautiful. He tried to remember that when his mind inevitably drifted back to the last time he spoke to Tyler, leaning on the window of the moving van Josh was driving to the other side of the country. He thought a little distance would help ease the feelings he had for Tyler, which were too rapidly getting out of hand these days.

 _Gonna miss you. I love you, man._ Tyler’s voice echoed in Josh’s head like he was right there in the passenger’s seat. Did he love Josh though, really? Love was relative, Josh thought, and compared to how Josh felt, Tyler’s feelings for Josh were a muted, pale, emptiness like nothing about Tyler was. It made Josh sick to his stomach.

Josh hardly ever got like this. Really, Tyler was the emo one. Josh was the happy, chill, rock of a person that people could lean on. And that idea of him was there for a reason; Josh really was a stoic guy, emotionally and physically. But anybody who stands tall for too long eventually has to crumble, just every once in a while, to rest the tired spine that holds him so high. This was one of those times, one of those few moments where Josh let himself crumble. Nobody knew where he was or what he was up to. He was in between tours and recording and it was perfectly acceptable for him to have some time for himself, so everyone allowed it. No one was calling after him or checking up on him. They didn’t have proper reason to. Now was the perfect time for emotional collapse. It was a long time coming, Josh knew. He felt the depression creeping up from his bowels, creeping up his stomach and along his tired spine, up into his throat where it formed a lump. That lump sat for days until the time was right, and when it was, Josh got into his car and got on I-5 North and drove until he stopped seeing lights and started seeing cacti. He must have been near Lebec at this point, about an hour and a half north of Los Angeles, where home was now.

Josh pulled over, cursing the fact that he was human. He ridiculed himself for trivial things when he was depressed. Stopping at a gas station to take a piss and buy a protein bar to quell his aching bladder and growling stomach felt so stupid. He felt like he should be too depressed to do things like eat and pee. To be fair, he had hardly eaten these past few days, but Josh forced himself to push different things past his lips, and no matter what foods he forced in, his tongue was always met with cardboard. Josh had to chew until the food was almost liquid just to put off swallowing it. He knew better than to let himself starve, knew that by the third day, he would start to shake and his heart would start to stutter and people would start to worry, and that was the last thing he wanted. He had to stay alive for the people he loved, for Tyler. As Josh climbed back into his front seat, the urge to feel humiliated about having an interaction with someone while he was still crying was quelled by how dull his emotions were over the loud hum of numbness he felt in his chest. The crying was necessary. The tears started falling the moment his car left his new driveway, just as Josh had counted on, and they would not stop until his emo binge was over with, and that moment hadn’t come just yet. The man had a bit more left in him. He gripped the protein bar and his chest heaved, taking in a big chunk of shuddering oxygen and shattering it so that it came back out in a broken sob. The last dam broke at hearing his own cry, and Josh sobbed for a while, leaning his elbows on his steering wheel and pressing the palms of his fists, one still gripping a newly purchased protein bar, over his eyes. After a few minutes, his cries became whimpers became shuddering breaths. Josh straightened and looked into his hand, forgotten protein bar squished into a protein lump, barely distinguishable if not for the crinkled wrapper encasing it. He tossed it into his passenger’s seat, where Tyler was not sitting, and started the car. When he got back onto I-5, he headed South, back towards his house. He would get home exhausted and climb into bed and sleep for the first time in days, and then tomorrow maybe food would have flavor again.

…

A few months later and Josh was back on the road with the very object of his affection. Despite that first episode, Josh was right about the distance helping. He felt like he could breath for once, and he took in the clean air eagerly, letting himself be happy again. He told himself it would be okay. The downside to all that clean air was coming right back to touring, sharing close quarters and smelling Tyler’s sweat, watching his lips move when he spoke and sang, both equally beautiful. The sudden TylerTylerTyler hit Josh like a brick at his chest, thudding hard against his heart. Josh was suffocating then. It only took sixteen days on the road before Josh felt the lump return to his throat, choking him and making it too hard to swallow all the cardboard food he forced between his teeth. It took sixteen days for him to lock himself in the tour bus bathroom and break down again. He held Tyler’s disposable razor in his right hand, spinning it by the handle and watching the light bounce off of the sharp silver edge. He thought of how easy it would be to cut a neat cross hatch pattern into his arm, the blood coming fast and the pain only hanging around for a short while before Josh was finally free of these feelings. The cleanup would not be as neat this time. It would be a bloody mess, biblical, like the red moon Daniel warned about in The Bible. Josh shut his eyes at that, feeling guilty about bringing God and religion into this.

The guilt is muted though, just like all his feelings save for the crippling sadness that is the love he feels for the man just outside the room. Josh started a bit at the realization. He imagined Tyler knocking after too long and getting no response, panicking and busting open the door to find Josh in a pool of his own blood. He imagined Tyler picking up Josh instinctively, tears spilling over his cheeks because deep down he knows it’s hopeless, though he tries to yell for Josh to wake up, holding Josh’s body, already growing cold, to his chest. It would completely destroy Tyler. With the image of a desperate and heartbroken Tyler, Josh put the razor back in Tyler’s toiletries bag and turned on the tiny shower, stepping in and standing under the weak spray. He found himself wondering again if he really cared about anything. He found himself hating who he was, hating his life, and he didn’t know if he cared about that hate. Everything was just pretending to be something prettier anyway; everything was pretending to by Tyler. Josh imagined Tyler everywhere, like next to him on the couch while he played video games alone, or next to him in his cold hotel bed every few nights. It was like living with a ghost. He stood under the water until the tears stopped coming.

Once he felt like he had it under control, he dried off half-heartedly and wrapped the towel around his waist. He looked into the mirror and saw emptiness in his own eyes. He wanted to tear them out, so maybe he could stop seeing Tyler everywhere. He wanted to tear out his heart, so he could stop feeling so much for Tyler. He thought about how the man was so fragile and sweet, how Josh so often just wanted to hold Tyler, cage him in his arms and pet his hair, how Josh wanted to save this kid from all his overwhelming sorrow. But Tyler didn’t need Josh for that. Tyler was pouring his sorrow into music, music that Josh helped make, music that made Josh want to hold Tyler that much tighter. And Tyler had Jenna. Josh was the one with the sorrow now.  

With Jenna in the picture, there was nothing he could do about it anyway. He respected marriage and fidelity, he was not going to wreck a home. When he first met Tyler, there was obvious chemistry, there were sparks. Josh pretended he didn’t notice, played dumb (and straight) and focused on being just friends. Tyler must have gotten the message, and after a while their longing looks turned into companionable ones, their lingering touches turned into claps on the back and high fives. There was a day it all came to a head, with finality. Josh and Tyler were in California, before Josh every had the idea to move there, and they had a free day before they would actually be playing. They went to a nature exhibit off the coast, marveling at the water-based animals that were definitely not in Ohio. A couple hours into their exploration, they rounded a corner of rock and found themselves walking through a dark cave. The floor of the cave was water, the men standing on a bridge with a glass fence on it to separate them from the caves inhabitants. Said inhabitants turned out to be sea lions, and both of them melted at the sight. They were basically wet puppies, and as Tyler cooed at the animals, Josh just watched on in awe at Tyler’s wide grin and the adoration painted on his face, wishing for a very small moment that he was the sea lion Tyler’s eyes were fixed on. Tyler turned to him suddenly, still smiling, and Josh’s heart constricted under the weight of it.

“I forgot to tell you, I met this girl. Jenna? You might know her, she’s friends with Chris, and Mark, too. Anyway, I’m pretty sure she’s the one. Like, we’ve only been on one date, but everyone’s always saying “when you know, you know,” and like, I think I know.” Tyler looked proud of himself, elated at the prospect of having found love, and Josh was a slave to his happiness. While the sudden declaration made Josh’s stomach drop, the lining disappearing and letting his stomach acid spill out all over his guts, he smiled back at Tyler.

“Seriously? That’s awesome! Do you have a picture? Jenna kinda sounds familiar…” Josh let Tyler ramble about her for a while and then return his attention to the sea lion that now appeared to be doing little water tricks for them, just jumps and spins. Josh stared down at the sea lion, forced smile slowly fading from his face, and he prayed to God to get him through this because it was the only thing he could do. He finished his prayer and valiantly ignored the urge to jump over the small barrier and into the frigid water, where he would politely ask the sea lion to hold his head under the water until he was asleep for good.

Josh shook the memory from his head, leaving the bathroom to step back out into the bus lounge area. He could see Tyler up ahead. Jenna had joined them for the first leg of the tour while she had a two-week vacation from work. She leaned into him just in that moment, and Josh shut his eyes just as their lips met in a soft, sweet kiss. He still wanted to tear his eyes out, before he saw too much of this. He wanted so badly to feel what Jenna felt. To have Tyler’s hands on either side of his face and his lips press, firm yet delicate, against Josh’s own. When Josh opened his eyes again, they had parted, giving each other a small smile before Jenna climbed into Tyler’s bunk for the night. Tyler turned and met Josh’s eye, the smile that was slowly fading suddenly returning.

“He man, I was about to come find you. I got the Nintendo hooked up to the TV,” he gestures behind Josh as he explains, and Josh turns to see that indeed the little television in the lounge area has a bulky, old Nintendo box precariously placed atop it. “You up for some late night gaming? Smash Bros?” Josh didn’t hesitate to respond, not for a second.

“Dude you know I suck at that game, Mario Kart and you’ve got yourself a deal.” Tyler grinned and plopped onto the couch, leaning forward to power on the console. Josh settled in next to him, leaving a polite inch of space between the two of them and pretending that he wasn’t just considering taking his own life to escape the fact that he was in love with Tyler Joseph.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for the lack of dialogue, this is mostly just a descriptive writing of how depression feels. But hey, I actually wrote something! It's been years since I actually wrote something that wasn't an email for work. So, yay me. 
> 
> Please give feedback or let me know if you see errors. I mix past and present tense writing a lot.


End file.
